copyranter on ANIMAL NY: BBDO recruitment ad.

Gary Numan scolded by Scottish Father Earth.

In a new TV spot for the Scottish government's Go Greener initiative, the English electric music pioneer again slathers on the heavy eye makeup to parody his performance from his classic video for "Cars." Good for you Gary, I love it! Because "...nothing seems right...in cars." (via) Previously in bad Green marketing: Tragically ironic. Even more tragically ironic. Pathetic. Even more pathetic. Porny. Beautiful but depressing. Evil.

Thursday, July 30, 2009

Shameless jeweler exploits solar eclipse.

(click ad) A diamond is forever. A solar eclipse: 6:39. To those who say 'it'll be a dark day before I get hitched,' this ad's for you. To coincide with the July 22nd eclipse, jeweler Michael Hill (well his agency McCann Erickson in Sydney, Australia) grabbed a cheap rights-free stock photo, added a little retouching, and voilá! cosmic advertising (black) magic. The power of the Sun beats Monogamy to the Power of 100 any day (image via). Previous diamond ads: De Beers promises "she won't say no." And, the most insulting diamond ad ever produced.

New DIESEL billboard. Please interpret.

(click image) You fashion-forward readers were a big help the last time I asked for assistance interpreting a downtown Diesel poster. This three-part board recently went up on the corner of Houston and Crosby. "Happiness comes from inside. I'm working on it." Well, the impish model is "working on" taking his pants off. To masturbate? To get a handjob from the (stuffed) bear bearing a Diesel wristwatch? He's gay and prefers "bears?" Previous silly Diesel adverts: Pete the Meat Puppet. Only steers and queers wear Diesel. Fuck you.

Wednesday, July 29, 2009

(click ad) Copy reads, in part: "The beauty photographed above is a total cooking appliance strategically stacked and endowed with the most refined developments..."That's Dick Van Dyke Show and Leaver It To Beaver actor Richard Deacon, who was a gourmet chef and gay. So, he was much more interested in the well-built Thermodor during this shoot.(image via)Previously in chesty 1970s ads: Penthouse. AKAI. The Nipple Bra™.

Calgary Flames playoff ads come back to bite them 3 months later.

(click ads) Calgary ad agency TAXI waited until this week to send these oopsie print ads to popular advertising posting site Ads Of The World. They're for bar Flames Central, and ran in Alberta prior to Calgary's opening round NHL series against Chicago—a series won by the Blackhawks 4 games to 2. Being a huge hockey fan (Habs), I couldn't resist re-posting them. Never a good idea to use the tired "get your golf clubs ready" joke against the other team. Even worse idea to use it in ads that can be saved to mercilessly mock you with forever. Last Stanley Cup win north of the border 1993...and counting (images via). Previous NHL posts: Sean Avery vogues for The Gap. Reebok introduces stupid pink NHL jerseys.

copyranter on ANIMAL NY: Jackie Chan for Kaspersky Lab.

T&A Ad Watch: Omax.

(click ads, pervs) Previously, a South Korean Olympus camera ad blatantly auto-focused on tits. Now, Publicis India has produced an even more ridiculously sexist campaign for Omax wide-angle lenses. Omax is a digital camera accessories company based in New Delhi. And, if these dramatizations are to be believed, they've completely revolutionized the physics of photography (Here's a third ad, set at the beach). Previously in: T&A ad watch. Previously in: bad camera ads.

Monday, July 27, 2009

copyranter on ANIMAL NY: TianTian air freshener.

The sleaziest...hearing aid ads you'll ever see.

(click ads) Apparently in New Zealand, people start losing their hearing younger? Because the Kiwi heavy metal bands play louder, longer shows that blow out their eardrums? I can't think of any other logical reason why one would include a naked hussy and a tattooed, tasseled tranny (not a tranny, according to a comment by the ad agency) in hearing aid print ads. Well, except for...why not? No such sordidness found on the Widex website. (images via). Previous unsexy products sold with sex: Rachachuros meat seasoning, Heinz soups, Method floor cleaner, and Lorgan's used furniture.

Friday, July 24, 2009

No posts today.

Preparing for the big party tomorrow celebrating my parents' 50th wedding anniversary. They are still truly, madly, deeply in love with each other. That's my cool-as-Hell Dad, when he was still unhitched. Back Monday.

Thursday, July 23, 2009

copyranter on ANIMAL NY: SEAT Altea.

TDK Shot Andy Warhol.

(click ad) Andy Warhol apparently did a few Japanese ads in the 70s-early 80s. Here, in a TDK cassette tape ad, the ad art director from Pittsburgh's got a Ludwig marching bass drum strapped to his fragile frame next to a cast member from Cats. I wish I could translate the copy (image via). related: art appreciation with copyranter—Warhol's urine canvas vs. copyranter's urine canvas.

copyranter on ANIMAL NY: Tennessee Highway Patrol.

Israeli cellular company solves West Bank crisis with a soccer ball.

The faceless enemy! This TV spot for Cellcom, Israel's leading cellular provider, has apparently infuriated more than a few Arabs, including Arab-Israeli Knesset member Ahmad Tibi (that, according to the Guardian). Copy translation from the end of the spot: "What do we all want? Just to have a little fun." One Russian commenter at adme.ru suggested that in real life, the Palestinians would've put a bomb in the ball before throwing it back. Spot by McCann-Erickson, Israel. Previous controversial Middle Eastern advertising: Bacardi's hot summer accessory: the ugly girlfriend. Bayer Egypt cooks some babies. Israeli bookstore chain mocks dumb blondes.

Tuesday, July 21, 2009

copyranter on ANIMAL NY: Stella McCartney.

Corcoran's new emotional math.

(click ad to read) Nobody's buying your million-dollar one-bedroom anytime soon, stubborn, rich NYCer who refuses to lower your asinine asking price one fucking cent. But at least evil Corcoran is out there fighting for you, trying to justify your number with confusing, warm and fuzzy square footage calculations (scanned from the Home supplement to the New York Times). Previously in SHUT-UP CORCORAN: the Hamptons Dockside Douchebag, the three-story baby triplex, the divorced iBanker fuckpad, the up-state horse fucker, and galling Earth Day irony.

This cutesy 60-second spot, which I first saw posted last month, features the most dubiously cutesy ad metaphor I've seen since State Street equated high-risk SPDR ETFs with adorable Fox Terrier puppy love. OLF (Oljeindustriens Landsforening), the Norwegian Oil Industry Association, would like us all to know that their phallic, violent drilling exploration efforts are exactly like a cute little boy shyly kissing lots of girls. But what the girls don't know is that they'll all soon be dead because evil oil boy's lips are coated with toxic benzine. Time for an oil company cute-off! Who wins: OLF's kissy kissing, Shell's cutesy flower-emitting smoke stacks, or bp's cutesy-wootsey logo lock-up?

copyranter on ANIMAL NY: Jim Beam "Red Stag" bourbon.

(click ad) Previously, via South Africa, Durex "O" gel produced a sonic shriek heard by the space station astronauts. Now, in a print ad by McCann-Erickson in Milan, Italy, we have a climactic female who apparently consumes a healthy diet full of biotin, zinc and iron (which produces strong nails). Advertising 101 comment: a more subtle visual of just the dresser damage without the woman's arm would have made for a slightly better ad (image via). Previous Durex lubricant ad: the choo-choo is stuck in the poo-poo.

Joe Jackson the star of a new Brazilian child abuse ad.

(click ad) Well, why not? The heartless bastard beat Michael, and even supposedly kicked him in the balls. New print ad by ad agency Energy in São Paulo for CRAMI, a regional center for the care of ill-treated infants and children. The clipped newspaper article is about Michael posthumously getting revenge by leaving his father out of his will. The ad headline has been translated by the agency for publicity purposes. I plugged the Portuguese body copy into Babblefish, and it's just your basic boilerplate child abuse ad verbiage. A cheap publicity grab, sure, and—creatively-speaking—the ad's flat. But if exploiting the Jacksons helps the center with its mission, I don't have a problem with it (image via). Previously: two illegal Michael Jackson ads from 2008. Jacko shows up in Chinese skin-whitening ad. Previous child abuse awareness ads.

Friday, July 17, 2009

Link Haze, 7/17/09.

• New stuff from WK.• Denver's toilet is running.• Irish heaven in Greenpoint.• Bed sore lawyer commercials.• Make Oxycontin more like heroin.• Big Brothers/Sisters spot pitch perfect.• How well do you know your animal poop? Take a fun test.• Max Motors gives away a free AK-47 with every truck (via).

copyranter on ANIMAL NY: Durex condoms.

Anti-domestic violence advertising goes low-tech.

(click image) As we saw with the high-tech Amnesty International bus poster in Berlin, domestic violence often goes unseen. But often not unheard! To illustrate that fact, ad agency TBWA in Lisbon, Portugal created these screaming ad strips that were inserted into apartment building openings around the city. The (translated) copy on the strips reads: "An escaping sound can be a cry for help. Domestic violence. If you hear it, report it." How invasive! What's next? Sky-writing ads that read: "Domestic violence is skyrocketing. Report it today!" (image via) Related: a roundup of recent anti-domestic violence advertising.

Thursday, July 16, 2009

You just walked on the F*UCKING moon? Here's some Stouffer's.

(click ad) Washed down with yummy Tang. Jesus, that headline reads like a punishment statement. Ad is from the August 8th, 1969 Life, two weeks after the Apollo 11 astronauts returned to Earth. Copy reads, in part: "So 14 Stouffer's main dishes, side dishes and meat pies are featured on the menu throughout the critical postlunar quarantine period." Government contract, I guess. Or, did Nixon have a thing for Stouffer's? As mentioned in yesterday's post featuring the classic VW lunar module ad, today marks the 40th anniversary of the launch of Apollo 11.

KIA's ad agency creates beach promo seen by 10s of people.

(click image) How cute and useless. Los Angeles-based David & Goliath built this mini-version of classic beach advertising ostensibly to promote the cheapness of KIA cars. I'm assuming that's a California beach in this press photo that they sent out to ad posting sites. Note to D&G: You know what would have made a much better press photo? One with more than SIX beachgoers in it. Not that that would have mattered, because, you know, The thing's too small to read. But then, this stunt was created primarily to enter into ad awards shows (image via). Previous beach promos: Beach blankets shaped like pools of blood promote TV crime drama.

copyranter on ANIMAL NY: B'eauPal bottled water.

Wednesday, July 15, 2009

Matchbox Molds Little Soulless Killers.

(click ads) Children of War. Hey, I played army growing up, and killed many a neighborhood kid, some multiple times (I never got hit). And being an only child, I also played a lot of bedroom army, setting up epic illogical WWII toy battle fronts. But these Matchbox ads via Ogilvy & Mather in Singapore are just creepy and depressing (They appear to be real—full agency credits are listed.). I get the point: Matchbox makes realistic little war machine replicas. But what's with the thousand-mile stares on the young faux dogfaces? Why not also splatter some blood on tank boy's uni? These may be worse than the New Zealand armed forces recruitment ads that used designer toy soldiers and Tetris imagery to entice teens.

copyranter on ANIMAL NY: Mebucaine.

(click ad) In honor of the 40th anniversary of the first moon landing (Apollo 11 launched July 16, 1969) let's revisit a buygone day of advertising when the Doyle Dane Bernbach Volkswagen ads were the envy of every ad copywriter and art director in the solar system. This gem ran in Life on August 8th of that year, two weeks after the astronauts returned safely to Earth. No product shot, no body copy, no clowning Peter Stormare, no sexist Beetle belly visuals, no lame Night of The Hunter riffing. Just a timely, simple, effective truthful idea that sold the hell out of the car (image via).

Tuesday, July 14, 2009

Biz mag's solution to recession: eye checkups.

(click ads) The Baltimore Business Journal offers their keen 20/20 insight into your financial woes—"stay focused." Thanks! See, the money's out there, you're just not seeing it clearly. So, first go get your prescription changed, then get your subscription to the BBJ. I think I'll pass and instead just go buy myself a pair of rose-colored glasses, get drunk, and then take a fun ride on either the Economistmechanical bull or the German executive rodeo chair (campaign by Planit [get it?], via).